Mayoral hopeful Parker says she's 'ready to lead'

For Parker, it's all about the detailsMayoral candidate says she's 'ready to lead'

MIKE SNYDER, HOUSTON CHRONICLE

Published 5:30 am, Thursday, October 15, 2009

Photo: Johnny Hanson, Chronicle

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Annise Parker has played an integral role in the city's gay movement since 1979.

Annise Parker has played an integral role in the city's gay movement since 1979.

Photo: Johnny Hanson, Chronicle

Mayoral hopeful Parker says she's 'ready to lead'

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By her own account, Annise Parker was a shy, brainy little girl who struggled to overcome painful feelings of isolation by forcing herself to reach out to other people.

Today, watching the mayoral candidate in forums, speeches and fundraisers, it's hard to see any remnant of that timid child. She spoke with bold confidence, for example, in a recent pitch to the Harris County Democrats.

“I am ready to lead,” Parker declared again and again, her voice rising and her hands stabbing the air as she listed her achievements. “I am ready to lead, and there is no one else in this race who can say that.”

At 53, with 12 years in elected municipal office behind her, Parker betrays no doubts about her ability to manage the nation's fourth-largest city in the midst of a recession that's sapping municipal revenues. Nor is she daunted by the prospect of becoming one of the most prominent openly gay elected officials in the country.

If any trace of the young introvert remains, it is in an approach to campaigning and governing that emphasizes mastery of policy details over the social side of public life. Friends say Parker is secure in her intellect but has trouble summoning the sort of effortless bonhomie associated with politicians like Bill Clinton.

“Annise is not a backslapper,” said Houston attorney Chris Bell, a Parker supporter who served alongside her on City Council. “She's not the usual exuberant, gladhanding style of politician. She's reserved.”

Through the various stages of her public life — gay activist, neighborhood leader, six years as a council member and six as city controller — Parker said her leadership style has emphasized consensus-building rather than one-upmanship. She would bring this same approach to the mayor's office, she said.

“It's a call to civic engagement,” she said. “If you hear me on the stump, what I usually end with is not to have the expectation that you're going to send me to City Hall and I'm going to solve all your problems. Send me to City Hall, I'll open the doors to City Hall and we'll work on the problems together.”

Gay movement

Parker's family moved frequently when she was a child — from Houston's Spring Branch area to Biloxi, Miss.; Mannheim, Germany; and Charleston, S.C. These diverse influences sometimes reveal themselves in unexpected ways on the campaign trail.

The Mississippi years, for example, seemed to surface at a recent forum when she compared Houston's capital improvement planning to a mother slicing equal-size slices of pie — the word came out as “paaah” — for all her children.

Parker hasn't budged from Houston since returning here in 1974 to attend Rice University. Her involvement in gay politics began in 1979, the year after she graduated, when she helped organize a gay student group at Rice.

After college, Parker went to work using new computer software to do economic modeling in the oil and gas industry. In her free time, she plunged into community involvement, joining the boards of gay and lesbian organizations and riding in Houston's first Pride Parade in 1979.

In 1986, the 30-year-old Parker was elected president of the Gay Political Caucus, assuming leadership of a community struggling to regain its political relevance. A year earlier, Houston voters overwhelmingly had rejected a job protection law for homosexual city employees. The backlash from that election and the emerging AIDS epidemic fueled anti-gay rhetoric. Politicians abruptly stopped seeking the caucus's endorsement.

Longtime gay activist Ray Hill said Parker was an effective leader at a difficult time. Yet her personality was not ideal for leading a narrowly focused movement, he said.

“Annise Parker is a very level-headed, actually kind of constrained thinker for the role of community activist,” Hill said. “She's not a firebrand. She's cautious, she's thoughtful and she's very smart.”

Parker recalled those years as simultaneously rewarding and frightening.

“It was a scary, very different time,” she said. “The two most visible lesbian activists in Houston were myself and Sue Lovell (now a City Council member). We had regular death threats, our tires slashed, vandalism.”

‘A very generous heart'

Parker's private sector portfolio includes co-ownership of a Houston gay/feminist bookstore, Inklings, from 1988 to 1998. Her partner in the venture, Pokey Anderson, came to know Parker as a competent businesswoman but saw another side of her.

“One of the things that impressed me about Annise was that she was spending at least one weekend a month taking care of her grandparents in East Texas,” Anderson said. “People might not know these things about Annise. They know her as a political person, but they might not know her heart. She has a very generous heart.”

When she isn't working, friends say, Parker enjoys writing poetry for public readings. She's a baseball fan who has coached youth softball and attends Astros and Rice games.

Many of her nonworking hours are devoted to community activities. It was a desire for something new, Parker said, that prompted her to move from gay activism to the next chapter in her life.

“I was bored with gay stuff,” she said. “I threw myself just as hard into 10 years of neighborhood activism.”

A rash of arson fires near her home prompted Parker and a neighbor to create the East Montrose Civic Association in 1990. Five years later, she became president of the Neartown Association, a coa­lition of Montrose-area civic clubs, making connections that would help her in her campaigns for public office.

“It is my thinking that once someone from our community gets elected to a public office, they are no longer ours. They belong to the community-at-large,” he said. “Annise Parker made that transition even before she ran for election, when she got involved with the Neartown Association. She guided that ship, and it gave her a much larger constituency and a much broader mandate.”

Made Houston history

Parker's first run for city office wasn't pretty.

She announced in 1991 that she would challenge District C Councilman Vince Ryan, in part because of Ryan's opposition to creating a council district centered in gay-friendly Montrose.

Parker said she was running not to punish Ryan but to help bring gays and lesbians into the political process. Ryan, now the Harris County attorney, remembers it differently.

“I was very disappointed when she ran against me because I had been her mentor,” said Ryan, who is supporting Councilman Peter Brown for mayor.

When the returns came in on Nov. 5, 1991, Ryan had crushed Parker, winning re-election with 77 percent of the vote.

Parker fared better in a 1995 special election for an open at-large council seat. She placed third in a 19-candidate field — falling short of the runoff but establishing herself as a credible candidate in a citywide campaign. Two years later, she earned 58 percent of the vote in a runoff for an at-large position, becoming the first openly gay elected official in Houston's history.

“I thought I was going to explode with happiness,” Parker told Outsmart magazine, describing the night of her victory.

Throughout her career, Parker has managed to embrace her importance to the gay community without being pigeonholed as the “gay candidate.” Her partner of almost 20 years, Kathy Hubbard, has appeared with Parker at public events, and the couple has two adopted daughters and a son.

“I absolutely believe that the citizens of Houston will vote for me knowing that I'm gay and knowing that it will mean a lot to my community — but they'll elect me knowing that I am the best, most qualified candidate,” Parker said. “I have always been honest with the voters — including about my sexual orientation.”